


you make me feel brand new (orbit)

by falterth



Category: Naruto
Genre: Dai-nana-han | Team 7 (Naruto)-centric, F/M, Fluff, Implied BAMF everyone, M/M, Multi, POINT IS HE'S BACK, Post-Canon, he went on a long walk i guess and just took off from there, sasuke is back my dudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-05 11:18:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14043105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falterth/pseuds/falterth
Summary: His next words go unspoken, but he knows that he doesn’t need to say them out loud for Naruto and Sakura to understand: “Here withyou."In which Sasuke returns to the village after two years of a much-needed break, and Naruto and Sakura are still the people he left behind. Stronger, maybe—surer, maybe—but still the same.





	you make me feel brand new (orbit)

**Author's Note:**

> blame [Hayato (FoxofPerdition)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxofPerdition/pseuds/Hayato) because we were talking ot3 and i was struck with the sudden inspiration to write this

Sasuke’s footfalls make the well-worn planks groan and creak. He’s not trying to be stealthy, though, so while the sounds are annoying, they aren’t really slowing him down because Naruto and Sakura have become so acquainted with his tread that they won’t put their guard up, and they won’t call anybody to intercept him. 

The door slides open part of the way, and candlelight falls on his cheeks. He blinks slowly because he’s pretending that he isn’t in a hurry, and then the door opens all the way and he feels like he’s been let into some great secret—some great warmth that wells up from the bottoms of his feet and curls up inside of him like wisps of steam. 

Naruto is sleeping with his head in Sakura’s lap. Sakura is slowly running a brush through his hair and the expression—the soft, soft expression—on her face is enough to give him pause, to make him wait a few seconds before calling both of their names.

Sakura turns toward him—surprise doesn’t register because she knew he was there, she doesn’t _get_ surprised—and smiles and it’s so warm and sweet and genuine that Sasuke feels like crying.

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

I’ve been . . . taking care of some things. Sorting myself out.” 

“You got a haircut.”

It isn’t a question, because Sakura is sure of herself and she doesn’t _need_ to ask questions, but her tone is still light and it gives him room to answer. She still knows him.

“It . . . it looked stupid, after a while. Like a duck’s ass, if I’m being honest with you. Didn’t you ever get tired of that?” he asks, somewhat incredulously. He’s still quiet, though, because the last thing he wants to do right now is wake Naruto.

“It was endearing,” she says shortly, and puts the brush down in favor of running her fingers through Naruto’s hair. She takes a deep breath in, and then lets it out and when her posture relaxes, she looks smaller than she has in years. Smaller, but somehow twice as strong. “Naruto. He was—looking for you, a lot, even though he knew he’d never really find you if you didn’t _want_ him to. Never left Fire country’s borders, at least. He missed you. I missed you.”

Sasuke makes his way over to her, careful to slide the door closed behind him. When he sits down next to her, he tucks his knees into his chest and leans against her side. He feels the movement of Sakura’s arm next to him, and he sees the way Naruto’s hair catches in the soft golden light, and it tells him _rhythm, home, flame._  

He is sure that in this moment that he has never loved them so much as he does now. He lets a sigh out and asks her if they should wake Naruto yet.

“Mmmm.”

“What does that mean?”

“He’s going to be loud when he wakes up, and I want you all to myself right now. Just for a minute or so.” She takes her fingers away from Naruto’s scalp so that she can wrap an arm around Sasuke’s shoulders and kiss his cheek softly. 

He taps his foot, but he does not look at her. 

“You big, emotionally constipated _idiot,_ ” she says, with feeling and with exasperation. “We worried about you. We both knew that you were going to be fine, but we worried, you goofball. Tell us next time, so we can at _least_ give you a goodbye kiss before you leave.”

“There won’t be a next time. I’m done with the road for now.”

They are both quiet for a few moments—Sakura to process his words, and Sasuke to remind himself that he is _keeping that promise_.

“He’s Hokage, you know.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

The words are said haltingly, but only because they’ve been out of use for so long that Sasuke isn’t quite sure of how to let them out. He gets the feeling that he’s doing something wrong, that his responses should have more energy, or direction, but then he feels a finger coming to rest on his lips. The hand moves up to smooth out the brow he didn’t know he’d furrowed, and the laughter that spills out of Sakura’s mouth and into his waiting ears feels like clear, sweet water.

He feels like he can do anything, like he will never be weary again. He feels like a bright-eyed genin, ready to fight anything that crossed him or his friends and ready to _win_ those fights.

“You’re doing fine. Two years is a long time to go without saying it, eh?”

He tilts his head in her direction this time, and the kiss they share is sweet and long and she tastes like peppermint, cool and sharp and fresh and this is _just_ how he remembers her, except there’s a grace and fluidity to her movements that hadn’t been there before.

After they come apart (Sasuke could’ve gone on forever like that, in the warm room with a sleeping Naruto and Sakura kissing him), Sakura shakes Naruto’s shoulder, and just like that—he’s up and he’s blinking, coming slowly into his surroundings. When he spots Sasuke he leaps into the man’s waiting arms and it’s like Sasuke was never gone in the first place, because _this—_ this is the _excitement_ and the _blue eyes_ and the _fawning_ and the _boundless energy_ that he’d missed so much. 

Naruto is wind (shifting, joyful, eager) to Sakura’s water (adaptable, calm, collected), he is loud, exuberant laugher where she is cool smiles and giggles hidden behind her hand (sometimes there are moments in which she tilts her head back and laughs so hard that it shakes Sasuke’s soul—but those are rare and he is lucky to have them). Naruto is brash and boasting and his battle prowess brings a savage kind of joy to even the worst of enemies, and Sakura is the kind of woman who needs no words to let someone know that they are about to be crushed—wholly and fairly. Hers is the kind of strength whose reputation runs for miles in every direction, saturating people in its truth and cowing them with its might.

He is _theirs._ He’d wondered so often, out in the unsettled lands of Tea country, how he had come to deserve these two. In the next few moments, he figures out that he must have _that_ expression on his face again, because Naruto pulls back and Sakura shakes her head and Sasuke can’t tell who it is that speaks next because the words have his head light and his breath short:

“Stupid. We wouldn’t get anywhere without you motivating us, and we’re a _team._ We work together, period. Me ‘n Sakura—Naruto and I—we’re opposites, but you? You balance us out. Got that?”

Sasuke’s head dips forward—not in defeat, but in acknowledgement—and he lets himself laugh. “Yeah. Yeah, I got that.”

They are all silent for a moment, and the small room is a mess of blankets and pillows, and their limbs are tangled together and he had forgotten how much he’d missed the burning warmth of Naruto’s body heat but it’s okay because he’s _back_ now and his head is clear and they—in the ten or twenty minutes that he’s been back in Konoha—have burned away the last of the cobwebs that linger in his head.

“Let’s go watch the stars,” Sasuke says, but he doesn’t really mean that they should go right now because he can’t keep his eyes off of Naruto. He can’t stop looking at the way Naruto’s smile rests upon his face like it was meant to be right _there_ and _then_ and it’s all too much and then he’s actually kissing Naruto instead of just thinking about it. The kisses they share are always energetic and they make him tingle with energy that needs to be channeled somewhere, unless Naruto is especially tired and then they’re lethargic, slow, lazy—but they still instill in Sasuke a charge that makes him feel as though he could take on an army of a hundred thousand and come out on top.

He loses track of time for a while, and when he comes back into it he’s on his back and Naruto is sitting on his chest. Sakura is standing up with her hands on her hips; the exasperated expression on her face is clearly exaggerated, and her pale green eyes glimmer down at them playfully. Sasuke’s eyes take in every fiber of her being as she talks about going out to get some fresh air, and _then_ they could look at the stars like Sasuke had originally suggested. 

So they go, and they have fun chasing each other around Konohagakure in the dead of night before leaping _up, up, up_ and coming to rest on the huge carved likeness of Senju Hashirama’s head.

Sasuke is on his back, Naruto to his left and Sakura to his right. He talks with them about his travels, about people he has met on his journey, about what he’s discovered about himself—and then he talks about how much he’s missed them. He’s giddy, which is unusual for him, and lightheaded, which is even _more_ unusual for him, but he knows that it’s because he is seeing them after two years of separation. Two _long_ years.

 

_x_

 

There are hands in his hands, and he says his next words slowly and deliberately, mouth to the sky and back against stone:

“It was a good run. But I’m tired, and I’m home, and I’m here.”

His next words go unspoken, but he knows that he doesn’t need to say them out loud for Naruto and Sakura to understand:

“Here with _you._ ”

**Author's Note:**

> monogamy is for cowards. meet me in the ring
> 
> twitter: [@falterth](https://twitter.com/falterth)


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